Riding the metro recently, I saw an advertising poster showing a smiling young boy eating broccoli from a dinner dish also containing meat and potatoes. Text on the poster explained:
Kids are growing up healthier and living longer lives, thanks to the main ingredients of fertilizer – N (Nitrogen), P (Phosphorus) and K (Potassium). We simply could not feed the world without it.
Fertilizer is much more important than this poster suggests. Fertilizer no longer is used just to produce food. Large amounts of fertilizer have become central to major areas of social, political, educational, legal, and financial activity. As the poster’s tag line declares, “fertilizer / life’s main ingredient.” Only bureaucracy seems to flourish without fertilizer.
